A few years ago, I wrote about Adam Hamilton’s When Christians Get It Wrong. It seems especially important to talk about his book again in light of current political events and the election.

In a particularly lyrical passage, Hamilton writes “scientists act as God’s docents, whether they believe in God or not. By helping us understand God’s handiwork, they add to the majesty and glory of creation that, as a believer, leaves me with a greater sense of awe about the One who created all things.” Witnessing the behavior of self-proclaimed Christian legislators and candidates for public office, I have to say that they are not doing a very good job of telling the glory of God, not doing a good job at all sharing the majesty of human beings. In fact, I believe that the assaults on women’s reproductive health care demonstrate the ugly, depraved side of these so-called Christians.

Men like Richard Mourdock, John Koster, Todd Akin, Paul Ryan, and by extension Mitt Romney, lacking any human empathy (Christian compassion?), believe that women who suffer unimaginable violence from rape and incest should be further victimized by taking away their freedom of choice. But one’s faith shouldn’t be an issue that voters need to be wary of when it comes to choosing a candidate to support. What a person believes personally and what is legal, what is constitutional, and frankly, what is fair and just, is how a politician needs to promise to govern.  But such a concept doesn’t exist within the Republican party of NO. Their attempts to cut off funds needed to implement Title X family planning funds, allows employers to opt-out of covering contraception or pretty much any other medical care are written on the basis of their religious beliefs or moral convictions.

Another point that Hamilton makes is about the new testament of the Bible, which was an attempt to correct “self-righteousness, hypocrisy, judgmentalism, spiritual pride, moral compromise and a host of other issues” through one simple concept called LOVE.  Yet, every time I hear an antiabortion protester invoke the name of Jesus, I cringe. There’s nothing Christ-like in that invocation, particularly because it lacks love and is full of rage and contempt for any woman who enters an abortion clinic. Every time I hear the arrogant Paul Ryan’s conservative Catholic, staunch antiabortion mouth open about ending abortion, I gasp at his hubris and worry that he could one day be sitting in the oval office. His views are not about love or compassion. They’re about his right to impose policies based on his religion to mandate policies that impact women.

This country was founded on a separation of church and state. But we’re slipping into a theocracy that does not bode well for women. Think carefully when you vote next week.